From School Auditorium to Capitol Records

By DAN LEROY

Published: March 26, 2006

THE day before his first public appearance as a singer and guitarist, 12-year-old Javier Col?as so nervous that he hid in the school nurse's office, claiming to be sick. He fooled everyone but his choir teacher, who tracked him down and insisted that he perform.

It was the prospective audience that intimidated Mr. Col?then a shy seventh grader. His teacher had asked him to play for the eighth-grade girls' choir.

''I was scared completely white,'' recalled Mr. Col?now 28 and a resident of Manchester, with a chuckle. ''But my teacher said, 'Javier, you are going do this, and you are going to like it.' And I got this roaring applause from all these older girls that I thought were beautiful and cool,'' he said. ''If everybody would have booed, that could have been the end of it.''

Instead, it was a turning point for the sensitive boy with the acoustic guitar, who never looked back in his pursuit of a musical career. After graduating from Bunnell High School in Stratford, he studied music at the University of Hartford's Hartt School and began his professional career while he was in college.

Today Mr. Col?s an up-and-coming recording artist known simply by his first name. His debut, ''Javier,'' released in 2003 by Capitol Records, was a top-20 hit on the rhythm and blues charts. A follow-up, ''Left of Center,'' was released earlier this month by Capitol.

Part of Mr. Col? appeal, however, has not changed much since his school days. In an urban music field filled with would-be thugs and gangstas, he has carved out a niche as a self-described romantic gentleman. Mr. Col?as had a longtime girlfriend since college, and though his new single, ''Indecent Proposal,'' sounds risqu?it is in fact the story of the singer turning down a one-night stand.

The song, one of the few on the album Mr. Col?ad no hand in writing, attracted him because of its theme. ''I'm not an angel,'' he said with a smile. ''But this is how my mama raised me.''

That background is a key to the singer's success, said Gabor Viragh, an associate professor of music theory at the Hartt School, in West Hartford, where he taught Mr. Col?''A lot of people have the talent, but Javier is also just a nice, genuinely nice kid,'' Mr. Viragh said. ''It's one of his greatest assets.''

Mr. Col?a Connecticut native, recently moved to Manchester from Boston, and is happy to be close to his family again. His parents still live in Stratford; his brother, Pablo, 33, lives in Stamford, and his sister, Mickie, 31, lives in Newington.

''We all live just an hour apart now, so we see each other all the time,'' said Mr. Col?relaxing at a West Hartford restaurant, not far from the coffee shops where he used to perform James Taylor songs as a college student. He was scheduled to fly to Los Angeles the next day to tape an appearance on the television show ''Soul Train,'' but was already looking forward to returning home for some golf and family time.

Mr. Col?as born in Bridgeport, but his parents, seeking better schools and a safer environment, moved to nearby Stratford before he was a year old.

Even as an infant, Mr. Col?isplayed a talent for music, said his mother, Migdalia Col?''He was memorizing and singing baby songs at 16 or 17 months old,'' said Mrs. Col?who would later sign up her son for voice and dance lessons. ''So we knew as a baby that it was in his blood.''

Mr. Col? father, Pablo, who is a disc jockey, purchased WCUM-AM, a Spanish-language station in Bridgeport, in 1989. He is a native of the Dominican Republic; Mrs. Col?as born in Puerto Rico. Mr. Col? first summer job was erasing hundreds of tapes that contained four decades' worth of rhythm and blues songs played by the station's previous owner.

Before he could erase them, though, his mother -- ''who's a big lover of anything oldies,'' Mr. Colon said, wanted him to copy ''pretty much every single song'' onto cassettes, he recalled with a laugh. Those tapes gave the aspiring singer a valuable crash course in soul music.

That training would prove beneficial years later when, as a college student, he joined the R&B act EMCQ, the springboard for his professional career. When EMCQ opened a show for the soul-jazz trio Soulive, the group's guitarist, Eric Krasno, was impressed by Mr. Col? vocals, and recommended him to his friend Derek Trucks, who was in search of a singer for his own band.

Mr. Trucks, the nephew of the Allman Brothers' drummer Butch Trucks, offered the job to Mr. Col?who began touring just weeks after graduating from Hartt in 2000 with a music education degree. He would spend the next two years with the Derek Trucks Band, and had no reservations about joining an act that played for mainly white audiences.

''Derek's just a really worldly musician,'' Mr. Col?aid. ''He introduced me to so much stuff. Plus, I said, 'I want to be a singer for the rest of my life, and I need to start right now.' That stage time -- they can't teach you that in school.''

Leaving home, however, was difficult both for Mr. Col?nd his parents. Not seeing him every day ''was a shock for me,'' his father said. Then his mother had to undergo chemotherapy for cancer. The young man whom both parents describe as ''extremely sentimental'' said he ''felt guilty'' pursuing his dream while his mother was sick.

But he was able to arrange a couple of smoke-free Connecticut shows that his mother -- then breathing with the help of an oxygen tank -- was able to attend.

''It was a worrisome time,'' said Mrs. Col?who has recovered. ''But we were always in touch, on the phone. He has very strong feelings, and he's not afraid to show them.''

A former bandmate of Mr. Col? recommended him in 2001 to a Los Angeles producer, Kevin Cloud, who helped the singer record a solo demo that attracted the interest of several labels. Mr. Col?hose Capitol, which had just revamped its urban music division, because he believed the label would allow him the most creative freedom.

His parents never worried that being on a major label would change their son. ''We knew that Javier would always make the right decisions, and that he would not follow the trends,'' Mrs. Col?aid.

That Mr. Col?ot the attention of the music industry did not surprise Clark Saunders, his former professor, who taught him guitar at Hartt and is now the school's associate dean. ''The thing Javier has is the sparkle in the eye, and the ability to light up a room,'' Dr. Saunders said. ''Combined with his talent, that's what they're looking for in pop music.''

Mr. Col?alled his new album ''Left of Center'' to reflect his interest in varied musical styles. ''The Answer Is You'' is gospel-inspired, and ''Loving U'' is a gentle acoustic lament. ''Dance for Me'' has been given a reggaet?tyle remix; it is one of several hints of Latin influence in Mr. Col? music so far, and he hopes to record in Spanish in the future.

The constant, as it has been since he began writing songs, is the focus on romance -- something for which he makes no apologies.

''That's what R&B used to be,'' he said earnestly. ''And I feel right about that stuff. It just seems like I never run out of things to write about that topic.''

Photos: Javier Colón, who first performed before an audience when he was 12, is an up-and-coming recording artist known by his first name. (Photo by Thomas McDonald for The New York Times)